She couldn't remember how many towns they has passed through, but it was the last that one that she wept and pleaded to Jacques Monreaux to not to take her there. He hung her under his arm when she became too difficult. The only comfort she got was from seeing the great chasm that separated her from Berlin. It was a very tall, black city that had a dark cloud hovering over it with no rain or thunder. It hung over the city as still as could be. Smoke billowed out of some of the buildings feeding the great and terrible cloud while below waterfalls of muck spilt into the deep chasm to parts unknown.

    "They won't look for you here," he muttered. "Besides, this is a very sci-en-tif-ic community. You can learn from their scraps and their library. They'll let you go in so long as you don't smell too bad and aren't in the way."

    "Why should that matter?" Aubergine continued to kick in the air hoping for his grip to loosen.

    "You're not going to be a guttersnipe forever. We have to assume your dad is dead."

    Aubergine stopped moving making Monreaux smile. "There, there! You have to think of the brighter side. You are with me, and I promise to make sure that you get out of this better than if you were to have lived in that comfortable life of yours," he said in his slow manner of speaking. "You'll be brilliant and strong. Do you know how diamonds are formed?" Aubergine didn't seem to care. "Through heat and force, and that is exactly what I'm going to apply to you. You'll shine so bright that no one would dare to touch you."

    She wondered if the chasm encircled Berlin wholly as they began their trek on the bridge. A woman in a carriage covered her nose with her handkerchief and exclaimed, "Ugh! We have some more guttersnipes entering our city."

    The shade was drawn down so that Aubergine's and Monreaux's tattered clothing and poor hygiene could no longer offend the woman.

    Monreaux put Aubergine down and let her legs quake as she took in the intimidating view of the vertical bleak city. "Welcome to Berlin! Home to most of the world's magpies, ravens, and rats! And that's not the worst of it!" Monreaux laughed and swung to pick up Aubergine's wrist as they continued further into the city. Every once in a while he would stop trying to remember where his destination was. Aubergine didn't dare look at the city any more because she was so tired of being afraid. Her eyes remained on the cobblestone until the ground faded into dirt.

    "Ah! Here we are," Monreaux said with great satisfaction. It was another trash dump." Aubergine looked at it listlessly. Monreaux squatted down so that he was at eye level. "Yes it smells and yes it is squalor, but you fail to see the qualities that lie within. I am the brother who runs this place and he will not bother us if I should set up an abode here. We are no longer on the run. This is home."

    Aubergine certainly felt like crying, but it may have been utter exhaustion or shock that would not permit it. Happiness seemed like a cruel memory.

    Monreaux hummed a happy tune until he ordered Aubergine to stop and to lay low. He looked over a heap grimly until he suddenly exclaimed, "Olivier!"

    She waited sullenly as she heard them speak in some foreign tongue. She was only alarmed when she heard the two men arguing very heatedly. She peeked over to see a man who looked like a cleaner version of Monreaux (which happened to be no great feet). The other man saw Aubergine's bright, tightly wound, golden curls, and his eyes widened. "Why is there a little girl here," he asked in English.

    "That is none of your concern," growled Monreaux.

    "You can't surely mean to make her live here! She is better of with me…" Olivier's eyes widened as his cheek met with Monreaux's short blade.

    "She is my ward and she is my responsibility. I will take care of her and you will go back to your business. You have never seen her. Remember that." Monreaux, it seemed, spoke even slower when angered. Aubergine looked at Olivier pleadingly as he rushed away.

    "Bienvenue a la maison! Welcome home, Aubergine!" He peeled an old carriage frame away revealing that there was a hole to the trash heap. Aubergine started to run, but Monreaux was far too fast to let her escape. "You haven't even seen it to judge it. Let's go!"

    "This is home," Aubergine said attempting to convince her mind.

    "That it is," said Monreaux happily as he ducked under the little bells and lights that hung at the doorway. It was a very busy looking abode with worn paintings of varying sizes covering the walls. A train circled the perimeter of the ceiling, upside down. All the edge of the right wall was covered in various tattered cushions. It was brightly lit and vulgar at the same time.

    "I don't like it," Aubergine said with a very absolute tone.

    "You don't have to like it. Now let me tell you about the outside world. You are not to trust anyone but me. You are not to talk about your history while we are here. Your name is Eponine should anyone ask, and you are my cousin's daughter. Do not trust Olivier and do not ever be alone with him. I don't trust him with young girls." He cleared his throat. "You are and will always be a guttersnipe while you live here. Do not ever try to aspire to anything higher and do not draw any gentleman's or lady's attention. They are all villains in this city." He leant back in a legless chair. "I will teach you my ways so that you can ramble about the city every once in a while. It is dangerous out there. There will be people out there to hurt you but I can't keep my eye on you all of the time. I will need to work too. I can't depend on your father's stipend to assist me now."

    Aubergine looked at her surroundings, "Well it couldn't have been very much."

    The man crouched in his chair and smiled broadly. His back teeth were covered in gold. "Have you ever heard of being miserly?" He waited for Aubergine to shake her head. "All around this city I hide my wealth. I don't want to use it on frilly blouses or cufflinks, but something big." His brows knitted, "I'm just not sure what yet, but I have heard rearing a child is an expensive task so it will probably be put to use in you until your godfather or rather one of them will pay you back."

    "Mr. Galimov is my godfather. Mr. Teal is my father's friend. Get it straight at least," Aubergine said grumpily.

    "Either one will perform the same task, but now that we are so far away from sea I think the only one I'll be able to take you to is Mr. Galimov."

    Aubergine looked at him with an annoyed expression.

    "Now, now! No need for that scowl. I'll take good care of you as any parent would under these conditions. It is a shame that I don't have a boy to look after you when I am at work. You will have to find one for me."

    "I don't need a boy," Aubergine looked at him with rage. "I don't need you either!"

    Monreaux jumped from his seat and beared down on her. He looked into her wide eyes so closely that she could feel his breath. "Listen to me. Do you like this feeling of fear?" Her eyes teared up as he sat back. He pulled up his wobbly hat to reveal that he was missing an ear. "This is the city's work my love. I was most certainly the strongest and the most brutal in my day, but this was done to me by another of my ilk. My pack is gone. You will need to be careful if you don't want this done to you."

    "Then why did you bring me here!" Aubergine started to throw things at him.

    "Because I know how this city works and I still have clout amongst my former gang. In the other cities I wouldn't know how things would pan out. At least in Berlin, the authorities won't take you away. Here the police and their ilk don't care about guttersnipes. If you haven't a dime they won't even give you a second glance." His gaze grew cold and Aubergine stopped her hand. "Be nice to me because I am the only link that you have to your godparent."

    Aubergine trembled horribly and she would have started to cry if it weren't for a knock at the door. "That would be my brother," he grunted and went up to the "door." After giving his brother thanks, he returned with a tray with a steaming bowl of soup and some warm bread. "Soup! Now don't get used to this kind of eating! My sister in law doesn't care for me much, but he must have said something about you to let him bring this over. I'll have to have a talk with both of them now."

    Monreaux began to eat the soup with relative ease, but it was Aubergine who had skipped the spoon entirely and drank it down.

    "Easy now! It is still hot!"

 

2: Meet the Carnies

   Eponine refused to come out of the shelter for a week. It was only until Monreaux carried her out did she finally enter back into the bleak city of Berlin. Never before did she see buildings reach so high into the sky.

   "All of this here is made of Carny's cheap steel." As if remembering, he turned back to Eponine. "Now the one place you must never go to is anywhere north of this street. There's a different sort of carny that you don't want to mess with."

   "Fine," Eponine said indifferently.

   "Not fine," Monreaux growled. He lifted up his hat again making her cringe. The memory of seeing the finer details of the gaping hole still was fresh in her mind. "This is one of my boy's work before he turned carny. Carny's are the most dangerous gang in Berlin. The only thing modest about them is that they won't go south of this street. Rich folk live down here and you'll have to be constantly on the run from the police, but it is a much better fate than to meet a carny. Do you got that?"

   "What do they look like?" Aubergine wanted to be certain to never get close to one.

   "If you wish to become a carny you will need to have very visible tattoos. They have no room for cowards or sneaks. Their clothing is very bright, so just be careful whenever you see one of them. The genteel folk of Berlin tend to wear pastels."

   "So what do you do when you are not diving through the trash at your brother's dump?"

   "It's first come first serve. If you want to find something really good you've got to get to it first. A good guttersnipe makes sure that they go through the bins quickly before collection. You can watch me in the first week, but after that I want you to go through them on your own."

   No longer did the filth disgust her. It was all quite natural as she collected sketches and any sort of useful metal in the rubble of the bins. Her mind started to spin as Monreaux taught her to make automata. Her imagination was broadened as she saw the beautiful artwork move hypnotically. She was to sell the devices at the Merchant Square at the end of the month. He threw a comb with broken teeth, some ribbon at her and had her make her way to Aunt Stephanie. It was Aunt Stephanie who gave her the pièce de résistance: a beautiful plum dress with olive accents. What was alarming was that she even bought her a pair of lovely shoes to go with the dress. Aunt Stephanie doted on her as if she were truly her aunt since she only had sons.

   "I wish I could be there with you, but bringing my tres enfants to market would be quite impossible," she murmured as she combed Eponine's hair. Stephanie had three boys at once and they were all toddlers still barely learning to walk.

   "I could take care of 'em," Monreaux offered, but he was met with an angry gaze. "Well I'll take you as far as the market place but then I'll have to make myself sparce. The police don't tolerate guttersnipes in the market at all."

   "I will be fine Monreaux," Eponine said with equal disdain as Stephanie's. Eponine had actually developed some fondness for Monreaux, but when she was with Stephanie it was quite impossible for her to not emulate Stephanie's mannerisms. She had soft, straight brown hair that reached to her abdomen. Aubergine looked at it with envy as she went to go get her perfume to spray on Eponine. Eponine couldn't stand her curls, which were far too tight to be fashionable.

   "You will be the prettiest girl at the market. Make sure that no one takes advantage of you and use your face to charm the genteel folk to give you their money. It is far more decent work than what a typical guttersnipe would be employed in. For that, Jacques, I am grateful." She knew that he hated his first name so that was the only name she referred him to.

   "Well it is my pleasure to give the ice queen a smile from time to time," he smirked and left the house before she could give him another glare.

   "Aunt Stephanie, I would love to make an automota theater. Wouldn't that be amazing to let the moving props help tell a story?"

   "It would be indeed! I would be your very first patron!" Stephanie hugged Eponine tightly. "Now be careful out there and do me proud." She kissed Eponine's forehead and spun her around quickly. "Go my child!"

 

   The marketplace was quite a wonderful sight. There were booths with beautiful, brightly colored, patterned overhangs. Eponine, however was taken further in where the paupers sold their goods. Eponine had to find her own spot as she heard a police whistle. Monreaux was gone within an instant and Eponine had to lead the pig and cart to a spot where she could sell the automata.

  She heard a man whistle at her so she glared back at him. The fellows he sat with looked tired and as ragged as he did. "No harm was meant," he laughed. "Just that I'd get your attention is all. Why don't you sell your things with my friends and I can take a different spot. A little girl shouldn't be here all by herself."

   She regarded the old man coolly, "How am I to tell you won't take advantage of me?"

   "Well you sure can take your chances out there, but I tell you what. We don't like seeing anything happening to the youngin's. Carny's have been patrolling down here as of late so you better make yourself some friends real quick." He saw Eponine's pride fade away. "So you know about them eh? Well just sit around my friends here and I'll take your pig and the cart elsewhere."

   "That's Mrs. Monreaux's pig," Eponine began.

   All of the men laughed heartily, "Don't worry. He won't let anything happen to it. The only people who don’t know Stephy would be the genteel folk, and none would dare cross her." The man shook his head as though he were in fright.

    "My name is Billy, the man who took your cart was George, Fred is the man who sits besides you, and Ted sits on the other side of him." She could swear that they were all brothers by the way they wore their beards and their clothes were similarly made up of patches.

   "Well it is a pleasure to meet your acquaintance. My name is Eponine Monreaux."

   "Oh!" They all gasped with mock honor. "We've got a lady in our presence!"

   "I'm not a lady, I'm a guttersnipe. If you'll look at this automaton here, I put it together by myself. Monreaux did the artwork, but I figured out how to build one on my own. I hope that I can make them all by myself in the next few months. She began to crank the automaton and the men gasped as a great blue whale surfaced from the blue waves of the automaton.

   "Well aint that a bute," one cried.

   "Well look at this darling," a posh voice exclaimed. A woman she had recognized from her first day at Berlin came onto the scene. She wore a pastel green dress with gold chains that circled the base of the bodice making for a tacky accent.

   "Do you think Gerald would like one of these?"

   A mustachioed man with a monocle stepped out of the crowd of perusers. "I daresay he would. How much for the automaton?"

   "Five sceattas." Eponine watched the man's eyebrows disappear behind his top hat.

   With a wry smile he took out five shiny sceattas and handed it to her. "You are quite the saleswoman."

   "It was a pleasure doing business with you."

   The couple must have had an important place in society because as soon as they left other people of high society came to purchase her automata. All she had now was a heavy purse, a pig and cart to take home with her. She gave the men ten percent of her earnings in thanks for letting her use their space and they were grateful for it. Ten percent and more customers coming to their business what more could they ask?

   She was about to leave when she saw a bizarre couple bumping past a person of high society. The gentleman looked at them with mild irritation and continued to walk the other way. What most certainly was a carny skipped away flaunting the purse he jilted only moments ago. His blue and gray hair was purposely tied up in great big knots. He looked as though he had scales on his face but they were tattoos of tears that ran from his eyes down somewhere past his collarbone. He wore a simple Ceylon blue vest and trousers with a bright white blouse. He followed behind a woman who had her bright orange skirt scandalously raised above her knees at the front. The woman’s tattoo involved a dark ink design with swirls along her collarbone. She also wore olive accents but around the scarf that hung loosely around her waist was a bronze pendulum that swung back and forth as she moved.  Eponine could see that she was singing something underneath her parasol. It was only when she was right in front of her she heard the woman sing, "To market to market to buy a fat pig…"

   Billy, Fred, and Ted got up and raced down the marketplace. Eponine followed until she saw her cart was tossed over. The axel was broken, her pig was gone, and the men were hunched over something. It was George who was terribly battered, but breathing.

   "Why would they do that," she gasped.

   "I guess they learned you were Monreaux's girl. It's their sick way of welcoming you to Berlin. George might have been a fool trying to fend off Limey, that queer looking fellow in the blue vest. Stephy's pig is as good as gone."

 

3: Merry Christmas

    The air felt different that day, and so was Monreaux. He had been uneasy since she came back from the market but there was something extra peculiar about him that day. He tied a piece of cloth loosely around her mouth and then dragged it down over her neck. “Now you can feel that the air is dry right? Well because of that we sometimes have coal dust falling from the sky. When that happens you put this on real quick and you head for any shelter. Even some of the genteel folk will allow you into their entranceway. You are not to steal anything from them do you understand?”

    “I’m not a common thief,” Eponine hissed.

    “We have a good system going on. Just so long as they let you in until it settles then I want you to come home straight away. That dust can eventually kill a person if they breathe it in too much.”

    Eponine could see that he was truly concerned. “Didn’t you say that everyone is a villain in this town?”

    “Aye,” he smirked. “You didn’t let me finish is all. Those men that let you sit at their spot at the market are a bit more than they appear to be. They are like the police for the impoverished. They are much better off than they appear to be since we give what little we can, but it all adds up. When we get to town, I’ll show you their mark. They’ve marked places before the stairs with a symbol to let children know to avoid that house at any cost.”

    “Why?”

    Monreaux’s face grew dark. “This is a scientific community remember. Some of these scientists kidnap children for whatever experiments they are concocting in their labs. That is why you don’t see too many guttersnipes in the streets, but I keep my eye on you. Just don’t stray too far from me and you might not have to worry about such things.”

 

    They entered the ragged city. At its core, Monreaux explained, was where most of the government offices and government officials lived. The outer parts that were south of Main were mostly occupied by the well to do and the rich. He recommended avoiding the government areas and very rich houses since they tended to have more policemen in the area. “The jewel however, is visiting the blacksmith which is where I’ll be showing you first. Dawn was starting to appear in the horizon. The dark buildings took on light, but somehow it didn’t look any more cheery than it did before.

    Tired steel boilers sat in between each building with pipes leading up to the top. The rumble of the coal cart was making its way down the street with muscular men with shovels. Monreaux gave them a nod and they returned the nod back. “Now those are the fellas you go to in a pickle. They’ll back you. Good men they are.” He suddenly stopped and stooped over.

    The house was very cheery looking for Berlin’s standards with its bright red door and sage wreath. However he tapped at the cobblestone with his walking stick before the house’s entrance began. It was shaped like a fancy “Y.” “That is what you’ll be looking for. I need you to spot two more of these on your own so that I know you can spot them in a pinch. Now go!”

    Eponine ran looking about the entrances of homes. She pointed at her first one excitedly, but she saw that Monreaux didn’t seem satisfied. He stopped at one house and shook his head. He spat at the ground and began to swirl his stick in it. Eponine’s face pinched as she approached him. “They are starting to catch on.” Some dirt that was in the same color as the cobblestone filled in the “Y.” “Well we’ll just have to make you memorize which houses are bad then. You know these three houses. Just try to remember them for now.”

    They could hear a clang become louder and louder as they finally reached the southernmost part of Berlin. “Esteban!” A man who was hammering down a chunk of metal looked up and smiled briefly and went back to work. “Esteban is normally easy to work with. Let’s see what we can wrestle from him today.”

    The moment they approached him, Esteban boomed, “So the enchanting girl from the marketplace has come to visit me.”

    Eponine couldn’t ever recall seeing a man of his liking at the marketplace. His skin very taught from the muscles underneath and he was incredibly large in height and width. “I don’t know if you are speaking of the right girl.”

    “Oh no. It is you. Everyone has been talking about you.” He gave one good final whack on the metal and then put it under water. The hiss sounded threatening. He looked at them and smiled. “You have come for my metal, I understand.”

    “Aye,” said Monreaux who was obviously confused about the man’s direction.

    “Christmas soon approaches, and my son needs a gift. Do you see the wheelbarrow over yonder?”

    “Aye.”

    “That is yours to take but I ask that you return with an automaton.”

    “Aye! It’s a deal,” Monreaux shook on it.

    He took out an automaton and began to disassemble it. Eponine watched as he crafted finer edges and pronounced the details further. “One good turn deserves another,” was the only response he gave her in her line of questioning.

    In the middle of the night on Christmas Eve she saw that Monreaux was dressed up in a Santa Clause outfit. Eponine fell back to sleep, when she woke up she saw a very sad fir tree leaning against the wall. Two crudely wrapped presents sat under the tree. Monreaux was dead asleep with his white beard loosely hanging around his chin.

    “Merry Christmas,” Eponine said as she tossed something over to him. She watched him snort as he woke up. He didn’t have his eyes open but he felt around the wrapping paper. “You open your present too.”

    The first present at first appeared to be a small belt, but as she took it out she realized they were a pair of tinted goggles. She looked at it curiously for a moment and then moved on to the next present. It was much larger and he had tied it up with as many different wrapping paper scraps so it was infinitely more difficult to unravel. It was worth it though. Eponine was quite excited to have been given the soldering iron. She turned to Monreaux to thank him, but she saw his eyes close. “The goggles are for when we take your pig to the welders. Merry Christmas Eponine.”

    “Merry Christmas Monreaux,” she said ecstatically. She saw that he wore the gift she had made for him: a crude medal made of different tin pieces and ribbon.